Category Archives: Mindset

I was not on quest to find a cure for anything when I started this process. I understood that my thinking was different to some of the people around me and that caused me to look further at what that was.

But don’t get me wrong I was not highly successful or very rich but I do have a very nice (some would say lazy) life without any stress or hassles that everyone else seems to face.

That does not mean I get away without the bad news. People still die and disease still strikes in my life as it will yours. It’s how you face them that makes the difference.

Mystarting point for this work was my thinking, the medical profession, the education system and the self development industry (life coaches and the writers on the subject), I wanted to know what it was that made the difference to people’s lives, what processes they used and what action really need to be taken by those suffering with depression, or similar conditions.

When I first started looking at the issues it was clear the much of what was delivered by the personal development industry was flawed, and again much of the information/drugs and therapy provided by others had chunks missing, which will go some way to explain why we are facing epidemic numbers of depression related conditions.

One of the things that struck me was this, wherever I looked in order to find help and all solutions I was left with a very narrow band of products and ideas all of which seem to be the same, the GPs were only providing a drug based solution or a best very limited therapy (talking treatment), and then there were some of the higher priced private clinics which offered a range of solutions.

The reality with all of these was that none of them offered any long-term permanent solutions everything seemed to be temporary which is why I started to do some work in order to find solutions that could deliver long-term, and did not need to be supported by any third party. The big issue is we as humans living in the Western world, with all of our medical resources and support are not taught how to think in the right way no give in any tools with which to apply the right way of thinking.

If any of the existing solutions were going to be permanent surely they would not be the massive problem that western society is faced with, quite simply many millions of people suffering with this condition called depression. My solution has been to consider very carefully what the options are and what tools are required purely because these did not exist in the right way.

So let me tell you what I found let them tell you why nothing works

Goals.

As an aside we are told that goals are something we should all have in order to move forward and 99% of us at some point have set goals that are measurable and dependent on a time frame.

Now to put that in perspective do you think Richard Branson sets goals this?

Do you think he stated in his ‘dream book’ – “I want to own a major airline based in the UK by 1998x” no he did not.

If he set goals like this which is the way the gurus and coaches teach us he would have given up long before he achieved it. Which kind of proves the self development industry quite a lot wrong.

Your thinking, my thinking. We are not taught to think and this ever connected world of social media and smart phones it’s just getting worse. Everyone is thinking in nano seconds and cannot see further than the ends of their noses.

The medical profession – despite the level of training and years of experience most of what they seem to offer is another drug, a concoction of drugs or a some other therapy. Now for some these cures may work. But there can be no solution to such a profound challenge as depression.

Because all of you are special and unique most solutions from the medical profession are a try, “lets try some x or y and see how that goes” but that may not be for you and weeks could go by before you end up with a solution. Then when you get a solution if you get a solution you could end up taking pills for a long while and never really dealing with the real issue.

Education – despite all of the skills passed down from teachers to pupils over a massively extended education process we seem never to be given the skills required in certain areas. Not once are we taught to how to look after ourselves, I mean really look after ourselves.

Then there are the issues of health and well being, we don’t eat properly and I am not talking about your five a day, nor do we exercise properly or think like we should. The content that is coming will help you with all of these.

So lets see how much shit information is out there.

Goal Setting – Amazon 1 – 16 of 47,806 Results

Positive Thinking – Amazon 23,098 Results

If you bother to search for Depression or Depression cures the results are similar thousands of results all pretty much talking about or coming up with the same end results.

Depression 29,676 Results

Surely not all of these can be right or if there was one that worked would we need another 29,000 or so results.

The simple answer is that none of these are really working.

But what about Drugs

Antidepressant medications prescribed for depression fall into four different classes of drugs:

serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)

atypical antidepressants

tricyclic antidepressants

monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs)

(Source Helpguide.org)

These are the commonly used prescription drugs.

The line I like most about commonly used antidepressants is this one “we know that an asprin will cure a headache but the same headache is not caused by a lack of asprin.

Likewise depression is not caused by a lack of any one of these drugs.

But with hundreds of these drugs on the market place which one will work for you? All or none.

No so long ago we were holding people in asylums and passing electrical currents through their heads in order to change how they felt. Now some of these may have provided limited solutions.

My proposal is that depression is caused by a range of factors some of which are a bit new age and others are about the lack of skills in certain areas. Controlling your mind is one of these (I am not talking about some kind of superpower). Just managing how you think, in the same way you would manage an awkward child.

The biggest factor I have worked out in relation to the solving the depression conundrum is

helping you to think like someone who is not suffering with anything.

If you are serious about getting some assistance with solving the errors in your thinking, please get in touch. I have a range of tools that will help you.

You can contact me using the form below, I do get booked up a lot but I know we will be able to find some time to help you.

This effin’ lunatic has controlled you for so long and you don’t even know it.

You know that voice in your head that just keeps on chattering away, keeps giving you ideas; thoughts that you think are real. The ones that insist on telling you how worthless you are; how rubbish you are; what failure your life really is.

Well let me explain something to you. It’s not real, it’s not a voice that’s unique to you! We all have them. It’s not real and it’s not you.

The Muppets or Muggles of this world, an amazing 99% of people have no idea that they are being controlled by something that has no idea what is going on, it’s mad. Has the intelligence of a Pea and never has anything positive to add to your life. It’s just your ego.

So you have this thought. You hear it as clear as day. It explains to you all of this bad stuff and you believing it as real human friend. Is that not madness? By changing how you think you can change your life for the better.

Do this little exercise over the coming two days. Write them down, as they come just list them on a pad pad, and review them once. You will find that they are just thoughts and nothing but that. They are not true and they are not you. No one I have given this exercise to has ever failed to learn that they are not real.

For the next couple of minutes just think about the number of thoughts that go through your head on daily basis – the fact is that some 99.99% (that’s nearly all) is driven by your ego and are random.

If you have ever read a newspaper article about a mass murderer, child killer or rapist and had read comments from their neighbour; they are usually in shock. And follow up with comments like “he/she was nice, always said hello and was polite. Kept their garden nice”. Yet they were killers!

These people had uncontrolled thoughts, that they believed to be real and acted on them.

So in the coming couple of days just observe them. Sit in quiet spot which means no TV/RADIO and just relax, keep a pad by your side and write down all the stuff that appears.

Don’t question any of them just observe, notice what comes up in your head. It could be stuff from the day, last week. Concerns and worries about others or yourself will come and go, the service that’s due on the car. Crap and loads of it will come and go for no reason, it’s completely random.

This is your ego – that bleedin’ nutter that keeps you where you are now and makes you think about stuff that will just hold you where you are. Probably stuck in a massive rut (a rut is just a grave without ends).

Now I not saying for one minute you are not ill. Provided your GP has given you the all clear – nothing physically wrong. Just that you are bit depressed! Do the exercise, you will find it empowering. Your thoughts are not you.

If you think you can do with some one on one support and some mind training, get it touch I know I can help you through it by telling you the truth about what is going on.

There are a couple of important things in this article, you may think that they are not connected but they are.

Do you think Richard Branson sets goals in the same way we have all been taught?

What about:-
Whoopi Goldberg – not only is she black but she is from a very disadvantaged background.

Alan Sugar – ideal background?

Anyone you care to think of did not and does not set goals in the way you have been taught. Do you think for one minute they used the same ‘SMART’ process are all taught.

Of course not they use a whole range of techniques but not what we think.

S = Specific
M = Measurable
A = Attainable
R = Realistic
T = Timely

Let me just blow these away for you.

Specific – becoming a Hollywood Actress.

Measurable – of course you need to know when you get there – stupid not too really.

Attainable – why would it have to be attainable this indicates that it might not be.

Realistic – do you think a Black, Underclass American Woman (not an attractive one at that – sorry to Stereotype) thought it was realistic to win an Oscar. How about a dyslexic student becoming one of the richest people on the planet – realistic.

Timely – do you think Branson, Sugar or Whoopi actually placed a time on their final objectives. Of course not to so would have been madness, no one knows how long it’s likely to take.

So this in my opinion proves that goal setting as thought of by the 99% of people on the planet is wrong, which is why so many don’t ever meet any of their objectives and just set you up for failure. Most of these put you in direct competition with other people and other people are not your competition – you are the only one you are competing against.

The competition is inside your own mind. Save, print or share the above. Or get in touch when you need to do some of this for yourself.

The article below is an important one when considering goal setting. See we are long time dead and time is short.

Bonnie worked in palliative care for many years, and got to see patients in the last three to twelve weeks of their lives. From her interactions with her patients, she found that in the twilight of their lives they shared five common regrets.

As you read this, think to yourself what could you do differently right now, with your life, so that you live a life of joy, happiness, and meaning, and not experience these regrets? But beware, YOU WILL experience these regrets unless you a) Become aware of them and b) take action to ensure you do not have them…

So the first step is awareness…

“When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently, common themes surfaced again and again. Here are the most common five:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made.

It is very important to try and honour at least some of your dreams along the way. From the moment that you lose your health, it is too late. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it.

2. I wish I didn’t work so hard.

This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children’s youth and their partner’s companionship. Women also spoke of this regret. But as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners.

All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.

By simplifying your lifestyle and making conscious choices along the way, it is possible to not need the income that you think you do. And by creating more space in your life, you become happier and more open to new opportunities, ones more suited to your new lifestyle.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.

We cannot control the reactions of others. However, although people may initially react when you change the way you are by speaking honestly, in the end it raises the relationship to a whole new and healthier level.

Either that or it releases the unhealthy relationship from your life. Either way, you win.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.

It is common for anyone in a busy lifestyle to let friendships slip. But when you are faced with your approaching death, the physical details of life fall away. People do want to get their financial affairs in order if possible. But it is not money or status that holds the true importance for them. They want to get things in order more for the benefit of those they love.

Usually though, they are too ill and weary to ever manage this task. It is all comes down to love and relationships in the end.

That is all that remains in the final weeks, love and relationships.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice.

They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called ‘comfort’ of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to themselves, that they were content. When deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.

When you are on your deathbed, what others think of you is a long way from your mind. How wonderful to be able to let go and smile again, long before you are dying.

Life is a choice. It is YOUR life. Choose consciously, choose wisely, choose honestly. Choose happiness.”

Article by Bonnie Ware, author of the book ‘The Top Five Regrets of the Dying’.

www.inspirationandchai.com/Regrets-of-the-Dying.html

Now How You Can Easily Avoid Those Regrets:

Now I originally read this a few years ago and just returned from a short holiday with friends, so I had a lot of emails in my inbox, but this rose to the top as I felt I wanted to write about it and demonstrate how some very simple thinking techniques mean you can ensure that you will not have those 5 regrets.

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
This holds so many back in life and it is a programmed bug people have been programmed with which they cannot find a way to remove. In gardening they say if you plant flowers then there is no room for weeds, but if you do not plant anything then weeds will grow. In the first few chapters of my book I shared with you a number of thinking techniques which aid this No.1 regret. If you still lack courage then I recommend you read those first 5 chapters again. If you’ve lost them, then you can get them here again:- Free Chapters

I also produced this article a while back to explain the simple way to plant flowers so that there is no space for weeds:- The ABC guide to living a legendary life

2. I wish I didn’t work so hard.

My entire life I have been called lazy and at the same time considered to be the hardest working person most people have ever met. I don’t hold much stock in opinions but rather only seek counsel. However, I have an advantage, work is not work to me, it is play. And I always thought people were mad to apply one ounce more effort than was needed to complete ANY task, so I looked for ways to make my life easier and easier.

Eventually I put a name to the techniques I was using automatically and it turns out that they were originally taught thousands of years ago by Lao Tzu and it was called the law of least effort. When you learn to apply it into every aspect of your life it becomes almost impossible to work too hard, as 1) you are not working anymore you are playing and 2) you continually look for easier ways to live and not create pain.

Here’s an article I wrote about hard work:

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

I’d never really thought of myself as a leader until I saw that I could easily express my feelings whereas as most others had to bury theirs. I used to wonder why they couldn’t talk and just say what they felt. At the time when a good employee didn’t speak up I used to drag it out of them and sometimes they would speak and share some amazing insight.

These same people would then do anything for me, all I had done was asked what they thought and been interested in what they said. Effectively I gave them permission to express their feelings and people loved me for it. I didn’t know this was good leadership, I just sought their counsel.

If you are wise on a subject then you will discover from within you the ability to express your feelings. If you can’t put words to your feelings then you need to ponder on them some more just by asking, why do I feel this way. Don’t judge the answer, just observe it. Your understanding will relax you and the more relaxed you get the easier it will be to express your feelings…

However, there is no rush as you are not bottling them up anymore, you are just considering why you feel certain things. The inevitable conclusion will be you expressing your feelings and almost certainly sharing some real wisdom at the same time… Now that’s how to express your feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

The reason people don’t stay in contact with their friends is that they have not established what is important in their life and then done that. Instead they have worked out what they think is important in their life and done that instead. They are also way too busy to do things which don’t matter that much.

I go out of my way to meet with friends whenever the opportunity presents itself. Many a time I have spent far too long with a friend because it felt right to do so when it didn’t move my primary aim forward. I consider my friends often and structure ways that by chance we can meet. In effect I design meeting friends into my life and have it fit round my primary aim.

When you design your life you get to choose what happens in it and you get to bring in all aspects such as friends. They are part of my design so I manufacture coincidences to have them appear in my life. Alison says to me that I’m always getting to spend time with friends as I drop whatever I’m doing when the chance to chat with one comes along.

I can do this because I am not in a rush, one of my favourite and most insightful quotes I added in the Bug Free Mind Process came from Roger Federer, when he said, ‘I have learnt to be even more patient.’ By not rushing you get more done.

When I used to work with my hands I used to have an affirmation which helped me be faster than ALL I worked with, ‘More haste, less speed.’ I would say it to myself a hundred times a day. Another good affirmation is, ‘Fast is slow, slow is fast.’ The meaning behind all of these is learn to slow down and you’ll get more done.

However, if you think you don’t have enough time then you’ll be right… But here’s an article I wrote which will show you how to slow down time:

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

Are you happy? Or are you sad? Would you like to be happier? Did you know that happiness is the goal behind EVERY goal, and in fact you can have instant and never ending happiness in any moment?

That’s IF you just learn a simple thinking technique which will empower you to have it today. You can get this thinking technique from the article I wrote here:

Conclusion:

Bonnie Ware’s wisdom should teach you what you need to know to ensure you don’t fail in life. Because when you read those 5 regrets it’s obvious that we should all be adhering to them. But as a race we are asleep and sleeping through our lives, this is because we have been programmed to think this way by others who are asleep too. It is the blind leading the blind.

Today I’ve given you a concise approach for free to tap into the thinking techniques which will insure you do not have any of those 5 main regrets when you die. If you want to make sure that you don’t have any regrets at all then make a decision to add the full undiluted Bug Free Mind Process to your life and you can begin living the life you were designed to be living, not the one you’ve ended up being programmed to live. Options on the process are available here:

You can choose to live your life, IF you think that it is important enough to pause and consider whether the things you are doing are actually taking you in the direction you truly want to go.

When looking for a solution to depression I had to do quite a lot of digging around and speaking to relevant specialists in many different fields. Some would be dismissive of anything that fell outside of their own experience and others, in all honesty had no idea what they were doing or saying.

What I had been looking for was a series of quick fixes to solve the whole depression thing, having realised very quickly the problem was not being solved by many of the health professionals.

The quick fixes I was looking for had to be immediate and doable by anyone, they also had to really work. The cynics reading this post will of course start to mutter that ‘it’s not possible’ or ‘it can’t be done’ and all I can say to that is this – you either think you can or you think you are can’t – and you are right.

People many years ago thought the earth was indeed flat, or that there was a Virgin that could give birth. We now know that there are some flaws in that thinking.

The shift that needs to happen in order to solve your depression problem has to come from one source; the only thing that can change your situation is you. This assumes that your depression is not caused by some other underlying health problem, you would know about if it was.

Your thoughts and feelings all belong to and are created by you, everyday you make a choice to keep on feeling like you do; nothing coming from the outside is going to change that any time soon until you start to change.

Buddhism teaches us that that in order to live happy lives you need to understand that happiness comes from within, it’s a choice to be happy. Those with nothing, no material possessions tend towards happiness because they understand that what is coming toward them is going to be better than what they have now. Rock bottom is always an incredible stable place to start a new life, a life of choosing.

One hack I will give you today, and this (if you actually execute it) will change your life forever. It’s this – give some of your stuff away. Being surrounded by stuff is not wealth, it’s a problem. Having a life full of stuff will never make you happy or create a feeling of happiness. Nothing new can come in whilst your life is full of…

One cause of depression is wanting more, wanting more will never lead to fulfillment or pleasure because it’s not changing what is going on between your ears and the only person that can make changes there is you. Nothing from the outside is going to change that.

Solving depression is a matter of learning some new stuff and doing old stuff differently, it is amazingly simple but not particularly easy. Remember learning to drive a car? Well notice how easy it is now. See you can learn stuff.

As an aside have you been aware of your thoughts whilst reading this article, my guess is you have not. But read it again and be aware of your thoughts, write them down as you read.

What is your self talk like, is it negative? Were any of them saying – try it, give it a go. Or were they just saying – you can’t change, it won’t work. Don’t react to it just observe them for the time being, repeat the same exercise in a couple of days and compare your thoughts. Are they the same or are they different?

Analysing this is not for today but I will deal with it in a later article.

If you are genuinely interested in getting one to one help curing your problem of depression get in touch today to arrange a time to discuss where I will start to solve your immediate problems, and remember you are not broken and don’t need fixing.

Richard Smith works in the area of personal and business development with a focus on the things that really make the difference – what is going on inside your head. I also teach mindfulness to help depression and other ailments of the body and mind. No woo woo just practical and proven things.

Our Best Buy financial products lists are available for subscribers. Importantly for you, we only ever tell the truth; which seems to irritate much of the financial industry. Only work for an arranged fee (and don't ever accept commission or a percentage of funds - that's just wrong). We believe that financial knowledge is close to being the most important knowledge you can have, this drives us to do what we do. You can contact us here.

This site uses cookies and we never share your personal information or contact details.